Two Heads of Women

In the art of German expressionism, the wood cut was an equally important means of expression as painting. The technique forced artists to produce a powerful drawing without the use of sensitive nuances, to create essential contrasts without colour transitions. The members of the artist group Die Brücke – Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Erich Heckel and Karl Schmidt-Rottluff – developed the technique into an autonomous means of expression. The drawing by Frits Van den Berghe was made during his exile in the Netherlands during the First World War and reveals the influence of these German artists. In these sketches, Van den Berghe applies their geometrical construction. Following their example, he jettisons perspective in favour of a graphical directness. Van den Berghe was familiar with the German illustrations from magazines such as Der Sturm and Das Kunstblatt.